Flexible Learning Strategies – Education Innovation Lab for Out of School Children

Veedee: Joint initiative of UNESCO Bangkok and Ignite ROI

Receiving personalised videos from your biggest stars and financially supporting education of disadvantaged children and youth

In support of the UN Sustainable Development Goal 4, UNESCO Bangkok Literacy and Lifelong Learning Team in collaboration with Ignite ROI, Thailand are promoting better access to learning opportunities for disadvantaged children and youth through flexible learning programmes with an aim to ensure that they obtain basic education as well as essential skills development.

Through the joint initiative called “Veedee”, celebrities can connect with their fans in a more personalized way, while contributing part of their booking fee to this charity program to support education of marginalized children and youth with UNESCO Bangkok under the following initiatives.

3 Key Themes of Support

1. Learning Coin: Promoting Learning Habits through Data Analysis and Cash Transfers for Disadvantaged Children

UNESCO Bangkok has been implementing the Learning Coin initiative in collaboration with POSCO 1% Foundation and Foundation for Rural Youth (FRY) to support marginalized migrant children in Thailand to continue to their studies and improve learning achievements.

One of the biggest reasons why children drop out of school is to start to work and financially support their parents and family. Children under this project use the mobile application LearnBig to read books and textbooks every day. All their efforts and achievements are saved in its database, which teachers can access so that they can provide personal support to children. At the same time, the database is analyzed monthly in terms of the children’s efforts and achievements to calculate the learning index for each child. Based on the index, parents receive cash transfers.

UNESCO Bangkok is expanding this project in Mae Hong Son, Nakhon Nayok, Yala and Amnat Charoen provinces with the Equitable Education Fund (EEF) and the Ministry of Education Thailand to support at least 500 out-of-school and disadvantaged children to learn and earn income

2. Lifelong Learning for Marginalized Youth and Adults

UNESCO Global Report on Adult Learning and Education shows that nearly half of countries worldwide spend less than 1% of their education budget on adult learning. Under-investment in adult learning education has significantly affected the implementation of lifelong learning policies at the national and local levels toward lifelong learning society.

UNESCO Bangkok has been strengthening capacity of the national governments, community learning center (CLC) managers and facilitators as well as lifelong learning practitioners in providing better quality adult learning education, and advocating for more innovative financial approaches to support this sector.

In Thailand, UNESCO Bangkok has been working closely with the Office of the Non-Formal and Informal Education (ONIE), Ministry of Education Thailand to expand access to lifelong learning programmes for marginalized youth and adults based on specific needs and different contexts of learners. The Online Course on Community Learning Centres and Lifelong Learning has been developed with 11 modules in multiple languages, offering the fundamental knowledge and best practices of adult learning education and lifelong learning with a certificate. The Online Course has reached over 1.1 million views across 78 countries.

For more information about our Online Course, please visit www.lll-olc.net

3. Education for Migrant Children: Bridging the educational gaps to support over 200,000 migrant children in Thailand

Thailand is home to approximately 400,000 children of migrant workers. However, due to complex situations and multiple factors, only half of these children are able to have access to any forms of education programmes despite the continuous efforts of the government, NGOs and educational stakeholders, leaving 200,000 migrant children to remain out of school in Thailand.

In support of the ASEAN Declaration on Strengthening Education for Out-of-School Children and Youth, UNESCO Bangkok is committed to:

• Promoting access to basic education for migrant and undocumented children on the Thai-Myanmar border;
• Supporting the governments in providing flexible learning pathways for these children regardless of their nationalities and legal status to ensure that they are able to pursue their education in Thailand as well as their home countries; and
• With the support of True Corporation, enhancing literacy and numeracy skills of migrant children through multi-lanugage reading application LearnBig, Trueplookpanya Satellite TV and internet.

Contacts

• For more information about UNESCO Bangkok’s Non-Formal Education and Literacy Team projects, please visit https://bangkok.unesco.org/theme/non-formal-education-and-literacy?page=1
• For more information about UNESCO Bangkok, please visit our website at https://bangkok.unesco.org
• Contact in English language: Mr Ichiro Miyazawa, Programme Specialist, [email protected]
• Contact in Thai language: Ms Sowirin Chuanprapun, Project Officer, [email protected]